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Tsubaki (椿, lit. "Camellia") - more commonly known as Okami (女将, lit. "Landlady", or Boss in the Funimation dub) in the present day - is a recurring character in the Konohana Kitan series. She runs Konohanatei, the hot springs inn that the main characters all work at.
Appearance[]
Okami often looks like a large red fox, with a yellow "fox fire" symbol often seen in Japanese mythology sketches on her forehead. She wears a black kimono with a white layer underneath, held together by a golden sash.
By applying make-up, she can take on a human form with fox ears and a tail much like her subordinates, in which her hair is tied back into a bun.
In her youth as depicted in Miracle on New Year's Eve (Episode 12 in the anime), she was a girl roughly as tall as Yuzu, seen wearing a kenzoku uniform and her hair pulled back in a ponytail
Personality[]
Okami manages Konohanatei with a no-nonsense, watchful eye. The girls antics have been shown to get on her nerves more than once, oftentimes resulting in Okami scaring the perpretrators with her substantially-vocal reactions.
Other times, however, she can display signs of protectiveness towards her subordinates as their boss, for instance standing up for Ren alongside Natsume when a drunken customer grabs the pinkette's posterior in Episode 3.
In her youth, though not as wise, Tsubaki was shown to be roughly as uptight as her future-self, at times acting as the straight man to with her more eccentric coworkers. It is implied that her diligence at this age is connected to her past, possibly from the pressure of needing to keep her job at the time as kenzoku due to lacking anywhere else to go.
Story[]
Early Life[]
Prior to the founding of Konohanatei and the assumption of her usual alias, Tsubaki was a young fox girl working for Inari Okami (Clarified to be a female Ukanomitama in the manga) as a kenzoku. Her occupation was to directly serve her deity via granting people's wishes, as long as they followed a specifiic code (To summarize, the wish can't be for themselves, and they had to follow a specific method of prayer).
At one point, the shrine where Tsubaki had worked was washed away in a landslide, this event having a potential connection to her moving from shrine to shrine from a young age. Later on, one eventful New Years' Eve would forever change the course of Tsubaki's life...
Konohana Kitan[]
Past[]
In Miracle on New Year's Eve, Tsubaki met a red-hood-wearing Yuzu for the very first time when the latter stumbled into the Path of Gods (A network connecting shrines around Japan that's disconnected from the world's conventional sense of space and time) chasing after and picking back up a mysterious scroll. Seeing a foxfire on the scroll the blonde had carried, Tsubaki mistook Yuzu for a fellow apprentice and took her with her to into the past. Soon realizing her mistake, Tsubaki and her coworkers were talked into helping Yuzu return home after hearing how much the girl's workplace meant to her, eventually succeeding when the scroll reacts to Tsubaki's touch, successfully sending Yuzu home.
After she heard out Inari Okami express her desire for a hot springs inn for the gods, it was then revealed that the scroll Yuzu was carrying was the future version of a scroll Yuzu had written, wishing that Tsubaki could find a warm home of her own. Although annoyed at the possibility that her coworker told the blonde of her past, Tsubaki smiled at the wish, and subsequently wrote her own wish that in the event she loses her way, Yuzu will return to the people who await her, thus explaining how Yuzu was able to return to the present in the first place.
Present[]
(Hundreds of) years after the past segment of Episode 12, Tsubaki is now known as the Okami in charge of Konohanatei, the hot springs inn founded as a result of the time loop set up by the future Yuzu's actions. Nowadays, she has little presence in the day-to-day activities of the main characters.
By the time Okami meets present-day Yuzu, she has long since forgotten about details of the past-side events of Miracle on New Year's Eve, only remembering by the end of aforementioned chapter/episode.
Relationships[]
Kiri[]
Okami and Kiri hold a Boss-Subordinate relationship. It is shown that Okami generally trusts Kiri with the role of head attendant despite the latter's sometimes-tricksterish nature.
Yuzu[]
Kozue[]
Okami and Kozue don't seem to interact in the Anime's Present, but it is evidenced by Episode 12 that they have known each other ever since their days as kenzoku.
Trivia[]
References[]
| v - e - dCharacters of Konohana Kitan | |
|---|---|
| Yuzu • Satsuki • Natsume • Ren • Kiri • Sakura • Tsubaki • Urinosuke • Okiku • Kozue | |
| Mizuki • Azusa • Nadeshiko • Yae | |
| Hiiragi • Ayame • Botan • Momo • Ume | |
| Ukanomitama • Entertainment Gods • Awanami • Battle God | |
| Yaobikuni • Medicine Seller • Yobei • Bungo-san | |
| Ghost Girl • Shino • Turtle • Kaito • Mr. Takahashi • Stepfather • Weaver • Rei • Lily • Aoi | |